Author: William Walsham How

How, William Walsham, D.D., son of William Wybergh How, Solicitor, Shrewsbury, was born Dec. 13, 1823, at Shrewsbury, and educated at Shrewsbury School and Wadham College, Oxford (B.A. 1845). Taking Holy Orders in 1846, he became successively Curate of St. George's, Kidderminster, 1846; and of Holy Cross, Shrewsbury, 1848. In 1851 he was preferred to the Rectory of Whittington, Diocese of St. Asaph, becoming Rural Dean in 1853, and Hon. Canon of the Cathedral in 1860. In 1879 he was appointed Rector of St. Andrew's Undershaft, London, and was consecrated Suffragan Bishop for East London, under the title of the Bishop of Bedford, and in 1888 Bishop of Wakefield. Bishop How is the author of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge Commen… Go to person page >

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Nearer, my God, to Thee, Hear Thou my prayer. Bishop W. W. How. [Nearness to God desired.] This was written for the 1861 edition of Morrell & How's Psalms & Hymns where it was given as No. 154, a somewhat slightly different version of the same having appeared in Kennedy (1863) a short time before, as:—

"Nearer to Thee, my God,
Still would I rise."

The 1864 text has been repeated in several collections in Great Britain and America. In the Society for Promoting Christian KnowledgeChurch Hymns, 1871, it begins:—